


One Good Reason

by Serenhawk



Category: Supernatural
Genre: Alternate Universe - Modern Setting, Boys Kissing, Counselor Dean, Dean/Cas Tropefest 5k Mid-Winter Challenge, Dirty Talk, First Time, Fluff, M/M, Missed Connection, Online Romance, Professor Castiel
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-04-02
Updated: 2017-04-02
Packaged: 2018-10-13 19:23:21
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,998
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/10520223
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Serenhawk/pseuds/Serenhawk
Summary: Castiel doesn't do casual encounters. He doesn't do relationships. In fact, if he had a choice he'd avoid human interaction in most circumstances. So when a chance meeting leads to an online conversation with a beguiling stranger, Castiel finds himself seduced in ways he's not prepared for.





	

**Author's Note:**

> A big thanks to Muse and Jojo for running this challenge, and a huge thank you to the lovely and talented Sconesandtextingandmurder for the supportive beta. Any mistakes left are my own.
> 
> For verisimilitude, a number of sections of text are embedded in images. I've done my damndest to size them so they don't require annoying horizontal scrolling on mobile, but a couple may have snuck through.
> 
> Please share in a moment of silence for the 2k of smut I had to delete from this draft.

 

“Don’t ever argue I don’t love you,” says an unctuous voice over Castiel’s shoulder as a leaf of paper wafts onto his lap.

He’d just sat down in one of the perilously sprung chairs offered by the Philosophy Department’s staff lounge, cradling a hard won coffee from their hand-me-down machine he’s decided has some kind of anger-management issue.

“What’s this?” he asks skeptically. Nothing is ever entirely free with Balthazar.

“Read it, Mr. Mysterious,” his friend commands, slumping into the neighboring worn velour atrocity.

“Mr what?” Castiel peers at the page, adjusting the distance to suit his depth of vision.

“When are you going to give in and admit you need glasses, Cassie. You know they’ll make you twice the sexy professor.”

“I’m not a Professor. Yet,” Castiel murmurs absently, taking in the scant lines.

 

 **_> > _ ** **_Lunch in Grays Park, Tuesday_ **

_We shared pie after the salad tragedy._

_Are you always that mysterious?_

post id: 5749845    posted: 3 days ago

 

He looks up with a sharp inhale. “How did you—?“

“It’s _him,_  isn’t it? Mr ‘Most sinful mouth on the earthly plain’.” Balthazar remains smug. “Don't gape, sweetheart, it’s not a good look on you. Unless you’re kneeling.”

“It’s never too late to file that harassment complaint,” Castiel intones, narrowing his look. “Though on this occasion I suppose I am grateful for your...proclivities.”

Balthazar ignores the aspersions. “What will you do, Cas? I know you fancy yourself a monk but you _owe_ yourself. If someone is lucky enough to catch your eye – actually, I can’t remember when last anyone did.”

“I’m not a monk. I just— ”Castiel’s irritation melts away as he ponders the question. Should he respond? _Can_ he? His stomach flip-flops, but those _eyes;_ they’d besieged him all week.

Their owner had sat on the usually secluded park bench Castiel occupied during his lunch breaks and turned that gaze on him like an unfurling solar system pulling him into orbit. What followed was a blur; flustered, he'd fumbled with his coat and upset the container holding his lunch to the ground, leading the stranger to offer his own. Mortified he’d refused, but unable to avert his stare from the mouth that claimed the first bite of pie, he’d accepted a taste offered from the man’s plastic fork in such a trance the flavor of dessert he couldn't now recall if his life depended on it.  

Barely a word was exchanged throughout the entire interaction before he'd bolted, then he’d spent the days since wandering in a fugue. Balthazar eventually enquired as to whether anything was amiss, prompting Castiel to divulge every detail and admit he’d been left spellbound by what had felt like one of the most intimate encounters of his life, albeit momentary, public, and completely anonymous.

“Castiel!”

“Pardon? Sorry, I was—”

“Daydreaming, I know. It’s all you’ve done this week,” Balthazar notes wryly. “If you don’t promise to go home and reply, I’ll do it on your behalf.”

“Okay… I will,” he assures, somewhat unconvincingly.

“It’s an email Cassie, not a proposal. One reply won’t irrevocably alter your decorous life plans,” his friend said, softening his tone.

A thought tolls like a cathedral bell in Castiel’s head. _Why does it feel like it already has?_

+

Dinner half eaten and an anonymous email account procured, Castiel sits at his computer, clicking ‘Reply’ then shutting the pop-up window five times as he agonizes over what to say. Should he be similarly cryptic? Flirtatious? He isn’t sure he knows how, even from the safety of an anon address. In the end he banishes his second guessing and takes a deep breath.

 

Finger hovering over _Send_ , he closes his eyes and taps, his nerves spiking. Peevishly shutting his laptop he rises to make a cup of tea, but before the kettle boils opts instead for the terrible brandy he'd been given for Christmas. Settling back on the couch with the bottle, he tries to focus on a book, but after twenty minutes of not absorbing a single word and sneaking wary glances at the computer, he gives up.

He pours another drink as it reboots. To his astonishment a reply already waits.

 

 

Searching his memory, he finally remembers.

 

 

Waiting, he sips at his glass. Finally, another message arrives.

 

 

Castiel barks a short laugh, startling himself.

 

Wishing he could retrieve the message the moment he hits send, Castiel pauses to ponder the merits of rapid alcohol consumption, deciding it’s warranted given how he's already out of his depth.

 

 

 

 

Half-aware he was at the bottom of his second generous glass and emboldened by the seeping warmth in his veins, Castiel decides to be as forthcoming as he dare.

 

 

Castiel hits _Send_ without reading over the text. He’s never so forward, if it could be considered forward from behind the safety of wifi.

Unease sets in when time stretches out with no further reply. Eventually he chooses the distraction of preparing for bed, hearing the faint alert as he's rinsing his toothbrush.

Walking back to the couch, he readies himself for a brush-off he’s sure is coming.

 

 

Castiel chuckles, a giddy reckless sound that echoes in his otherwise silent apartment. He’s in the midst of deciding if he should reply or quit while he was ahead when the message alert dings again. It contains a mobile number.

Finding his phone under the papers littering the countertop, he dashes the number into his contacts, then flips the device over in his palm for a few minutes. It sits uneasily, like holding a ticket to a journey he’s not quite sure he’s ready to embark on.  

Eventually he types two words.

+

Saturday morning he wakes to a notification chirping from his bedside. Groping blindly in the dim light, he pulls his phone in front of his face and squints at the harshly backlit screen.

 

The two words felt absurdly intimate, and he instantly forgives the nickname and atrociously early hour.

 

 

It’s only afterwards the double-entendre occurs to him.

 

 

He recklessly types a reply his sluggish brain doesn’t think through.

 

Chewing on a fingernail, he worries he’s being invasive, but the next message seems as playful as the rest.

 

Castiel has never been one for small talk, so ‘getting personal’ suits him, though he has to remind himself he’s often guilty of viewing people as collections of attributes; complicated but ordered mazes to find his way around purely for the satisfaction of doing so. Over time he's concluded feeling slightly out of step with the world and its inhabitants is a unhelpful product of living in his own head - a skill he learned in childhood. Being abstracted meant the unpredictability of others was less likely to affect him, or as his therapist distilled, he’s the unfortunate owner of Trust Issues.

Shaking off his reflection, he decides to be forthright.

 

The rest of the morning is spent swapping increasingly longer texts and learning a little about each other. Castiel explains his work at the university while he’s completing his doctorate degree, and that he moved to Kansas in an attempt to break from his oppressive family, though he omits the details.

In turn he learns Dean takes a handful of classes at the university while working downtown at a centre providing outreach services to youth dealing with addiction and social issues, revealing it became a calling after experiences with his teen brother falling into a drug habit and running away.

At some point they swap to a chat program, and then suddenly it’s midday and Castiel is still in his bathrobe and surviving on one black coffee.

Feeling stale he calls for an intermission, throws on some sweats, downs an orange juice and heads out for a run towards the campus. By the time he comes home, showers and cobbles together a late lunch he’s itching to open his laptop, but he staves off the impulse for a few more hours grading mediocre essays. There’s an irritating flutter in his chest when he boots up and a series of chat messages amounting to a game of 20 Questions pops up, but he gives in and replies.

When he looks up again it’s nearly dusk. Examining the crumbs littering his discarded lunch plate, he wonders how they possibly spent the entire afternoon exchanging favorite films, midnight snacks and most embarrassing stories like teenagers, and he hadn’t even noticed.

The chat box alert sounds, returning his eyes to the screen.

 

 

Castiel feels a strange mix of disappointment and relief. Not wanting to place any expectations on when (or if) they’d resume the conversation, he answers sincerely.

 

Brows hiking, he asks shrewdly;

but then instantly regrets the implicit presumption. He decides he really isn’t cut out for this rollercoaster when the reply has him shyly smiling to himself again.

 

 

It’s not an answer he can do justice to in a few words. But Dean saves him from the inarticulacy the question throws him into.

 

 

After signing off Castiel finds himself oddly bereft, and has to remind himself he’s only known Dean for twenty-four hours. Alone and despite having enjoyed the conversation, feelings of inadequacy crowd against the pull of enthral throughout the evening, only subsiding when he gets a string of unexpected texts from Dean as he climbs into bed.

 

 

Castiel chuckles, the sound echoing around his bedroom.

 

 

Switching off the light, he tucks under the comforter and debates, finally sending one more reply before reluctantly turning off his phone.

 

 

The next morning Castiel is almost disappointed he hasn’t heard from Dean. By mid-morning however, he reasons a friendly enquiry is warranted.

 

It’s a while before he receives a reply.

 

 

The barrage of short messages flick on an internal switch. It occurs to him how rapidly he’s becoming fixated on his notifications.

 

 

He makes a hasty deal with himself to not let it whole day disappear online like yesterday.

 

 

He breaks the deal. Bar a late afternoon jog, he spends most of the day absently puttering while chatting to Dean, setting a pattern for the next few days and well into his evenings. The conversation meanders organically, penetrating subjects blending with the banal and the carnal. Dean is a natural flirt and Castiel, for quite possibly the first time in his life, responds in kind. One minute they’ll be discussing Dean’s car or disordered childhood, the next his suggestive descriptions of erogenous desires and experiences have Castiel shifting in his uncomfortably tight slacks as he imagines enacting various scenarios with Dean. Worse, with increasing frequency he’s shyly depicting his thoughts back to Dean, and indulging himself with them as he’s lying in the dark.

By Wednesday night, titillation has almost become a competitive sport between them, and Castiel finds himself tied up in confused knots of arousal. When it comes to personal relationships he has few roadmaps to rely on, his lack of experience investing in other people usually only surpassed by his lack of interest or expectations. But he’s aware of his rapidly formed addiction to Dean’s presence despite being wary of the false sense of intimacy created online. They haven’t addressed meeting, and having previously discussed Dean’s unapologetic habit of one night stands, he nervously cuts into their chat.

 

 

The question is trite, but Dean’s answers are confounding him more than ever.

Would it be too hopeful to wonder if maybe he’s not the only one caught off-guard?

 

 

Castiel gulps.

 

 

Chewing at a hangnail, he sifts through his warring emotions.

 

 

His heart sinks, and he realizes his subconscious is giving him a hint. He needs to stop letting his ambitious lust running away with his rationale.

 

 

Castiel signs off and trudges to stand disconsolately in the shower, unsure he and Dean can be friends without their provocative flirting. He’s violently molding his pillow when his phone sings, his pulse leaping.

“Hello, Dean.”

_“Hey, Cas. You mind me calling? I wanted to say goodnight, in person.”_

The voice filtering down the line is much like he remembers from the handful of words Dean had said when they met. It makes him think, incomprehensibly, of bourbon and cinnamon sticks and camp fires.

“No, I don’t mind. It’s strange, hearing you,” he admits awkwardly.

“ _S_ _trange?”_

“It’s different, I suppose, to the impersonality of the written word.”

 _“I dunno Cas, we’ve been getting pretty personal,”_ Dean purrs.

“That’s the point, it’s one thing typing something intimate and clicking it away, this makes you… real.”

“ _Buddy, I promise you I’m very real.”_

“That’s what I’m afraid of,” he murmurs.

Dean chuckles softly. _“Well so I don’t scare you any further, I’ll hang up and message you tomorrow.”_

It’s Castiel’s turn to smile. “I’d like that. Night, Dean.”

+

Thursday he wakes to find a poignant email waiting. In it Dean details the history of Sam’s tragic derailment, filling in all the gaps Dean had merely hinted at. Laid out stoically, Castiel feels Dean’s heart bleeding through the text despite the tale stopping short of ending sadly. The desperation, the guilt and failure stand out between each line and it leaves him with a wishful ache to magic past pain away.

Sending a quick acknowledgment, he mulls over his response while working, but waits to reply until he’s made it home with a takeout dinner, opening his laptop and a chat session as he eats. In return for Dean prising himself open to him, Castiel reciprocates, typing out his own family melodrama full of sordid tales; betrayals, double-crosses and ultimately, mutual rejection. But it leaves him feeling flayed and disconsolate, and he excuses himself from the conversation shortly after Dean joins him online.

Half an hour later he’s lying restlessly in bed when his mobile rings. Swiping to pick up the call, he’s unsure if Dean’s voice is the exact or last thing he needs.

He’s told Dean too much. He’s just a stranger - and self-confessed Lothario - and he should be keeping him at arm’s length, not inviting him in or handing out pieces of himself to someone who in all probability only wants a fun hook-up.

“Dean.”

_“You okay? I got a weird vibe from you.”_

“Not really.”

 _“Talk to me_ ,” Dean pleads gently.

Castiel scoffs. “Five years of therapy hasn’t really helped, you probably can’t either,” he responds, fractious.

_“Ouch. Guess I’ll leave you be then.”_

“No, don’t! I’m sorry,” he returns, regretful. “Thinking about the past still affects me more than I hoped. Only family can still make you feel like shit even when you’ve nothing to do with them.”

 _“Yeah, they musta done a number on you, that’s the first time I’ve heard you use a time-out word,”_ Dean observes.

A smile invades his cheek. “I usually keep my vocabulary exemplary, since you claim to admire it.”

_“What can I say, it’s a turn on. So is your voice, by the way.”_

His mood turns on a dime. Simply hearing Dean’s warm-hearted tone, tender and enticing, is a welcome antidote to his melancholy. Or maybe that’s just because he’s in the middle of falling for him.

“Is that so?” he asks, deliberately low.

 _“Now who’s flirting,”_ Dean teases, chuckling. “ _Hey, Cas…_

_“Mmm?”_

_“What are you wearing?”_

Snickering at the cliché he confesses, “Nothing, as it happens. I’m in bed.”

_“That usual?”_

“I find clothing disruptive to sleep in.” There’s a significant pause, and muffled rustling. “Dean?”

Dean’s voice drops to a soft, strained murmur. _“Wish I was there with you.”_

Castiel’s insides lurch as a catalogue of desires bloom in unison. “I wish I knew what you smell like, how you feel under my hands,” he admits thickly, and too easily.

_“I wanna know what you taste like. I’ve thought about it a lot.”_

“You have?” he whispers.

_“Mmhmm. Licking over your skin, looking for the places that make you shiver.”_

“Dean—” Castiel whispers, gliding a hand over his ribs like he wishes at that moment Dean’s mouth was.

_“I want… I wanna kiss you, in the spot behind your ear where your hair curls, leave bite marks on your hips…watch you squirm on the end of my tongue—”_

Castiel melts, pooling into pure need at a few words. It’s instantaneous, his body nauseatingly sensitized but held maddeningly in-check.

_“You touching, Cas?”_

“Yes,” he admits, rolling his testes as Dean’s heavy breaths gust down the line. “Tell me what you’d like me to do to you,” he cues, “and what you’re doing, now.”

_“I’m rock hard already. And I’m teasing my ass because I really want you to hold me down and fuck me.”_

Castiel swallows a whimper at the image materializing in his mind. “De—”

 _“Goddamn I’m so fucken’ horny. I really wanna come right now listening to you. But I also don’t, because I wanna do it…ya know, WITH you_.”

Closing his eyes Castiel concedes, stilling his hand. “Likewise.”

“ _Cas?”_ Dean’s voice turns thin. _“This sounds creepy as fuck, but right now, I… I want to crawl inside you, curl up and sleep next to your heart for about a hundred years.”_

“Dean—“

“ _Sorry, it’s weird.”_ Dean interrupts again. “ _I don’t know how else to explain it. You make—.”_

“Dean,” he says firmly, shutting his eyes at the  reeling sensation. “I know what you mean. I uh…”

“ _What, Cas?_ ”

Castiel inhales sharply, holding back histrionic confessions threatening to scour their way out as the week-long fervor turns cloying, vertigo eating his admissions.

“I—” He waivers.

“ _Castiel?”_

“Yes?”

 _“We need to meet. I need to see you, like right the fuck now_ ,” Dean states, flat but urgent.

“Dean—”

_“I mean, we can go out, ya know? On a date. I’m not just talking sex, though I think that would be pretty fucken spectacular, but—“_

“I agree.”

“ _—uh, you do?”_

"Yes. I think we’ve stretched this as far as we can.” Castiel takes a deep but certain breath. “We need to go to bed. I don’t think we’re going to... move on, until we do.

Dean snorts. _“Wow.”_

“Um— Pardon?”

_“That just sounds like an argument I might have used on a chick when I was seventeen”._

Castiel winces. “Sorry. I’ve never been in this position before. I don’t think I have felt desire in this scale. I’m overwhelmed."

 _“Huh."_ Dean observes smugly. _"Guess I’ve pushed your buttons._ _When? Tomorrow?”_

“Okay,” he agrees, not trusting himself if left to consider for too long. “You are welcome here, or—”

 _“Text me the address.”_ An explosive breath echoes down the line. _“We’re gonna do this, right? We’ve built this up I know, and it’s just sex, but—“_

“Yes. Though I think we should cease talking about it now we’ve decided,” he says a little too curtly, surfing an abrupt wave of panic and trepidation. “I have to go. I need to sleep.”

“ _Okay… uh, goodnight, I guess_.”

“Goodnight. Sleep well,” he signs off, thawing.

Castiel regrets cutting their goodbye short but the reality of expectation suddenly hangs over him like a noose. He needs to step away from the constant gravitational pull and state of arousal they’d spun around themselves to the point it felt like a cocoon, and just think.

It was still just sex, like Dean had said.

He’s thoroughly mired in re-evaluating their entire history when his phone lights up.

Castiel looks to the darkened ceiling, as if an explanation of why Dean’s thoughts and doubts would mirror his own might be found above. The irony that Dean needs reassurance only stokes his hopeful flames, so he chooses his response carefully.

 

+

Fridays are his busiest, disallowing freedom to dwell on the evening to come despite his body humming like a high tension wire. He largely avoids it until Balthazar inevitably pokes his meddlesome nose into Castiel’s office.

“Will you stop hounding me if I tell you I’m seeing him tonight?” he says, feigning annoyance.  

“Thank bloody God for that. I shall, but only if you give me all the juicy details tomorrow. What are you doing? I should hope it’s each other.”

Castiel tsks loudly, but receives a jolt of nervous desire along his spine. _He’s really going to do this._

“Bal, I appreciate your interest in my short-term happiness, but leave me in peace or I won’t make it home in time to prepare for my guest.”

“He’s coming over?” Balthazar asks, astonished.

“Yes. Now go.”

“But—“

Glaring, he points out the door.

“ _Fine_. But Cas?”

“Mmm?”

“Have fun, or I’ll come by this weekend specifically to kick your unfairly toned arse.”

Castiel suppresses a laugh as the door closes. Balthazar’s heart is always in the right place even if he tries to make it appear otherwise.

Delving back into his obligations he pushes the night aside, but anticipation clamours around him the moment he opens his front door. He channels his nerves into putting some semblance of order into his apartment; changing his sheets, cursing at not investing in a nicer comforter, then hoping his guest will be too preoccupied to consider the state of his furnishings, his mind completing the loop back into anxiety at going through with the somewhat reckless meeting.

Questions tumble over each other in his head as he showers. Will this _thing_ even feel the same in person? Will Dean be the man he remembers, or has he put him on a pedestal over the past week (only a week!)? Are they each projecting subconscious needs onto a stranger? Could rushing sex ruin whatever else was happening between them, or has excitement fooled them into thinking there was a deeper meaning to their contact?

His empty stomach thunders, but he hasn’t bothered trying to pile food on top of the fitful butterflies. Stomping back into his kitchen, he pours a terrible brandy and perches on a stool, swilling down the glass while instructing himself not to ruin everything with his scrutinizing and insecurities.

He’s in the process of mentally gathering them together to put them away in a locked mental drawer when a text arrives.

Six characters are enough for him to slump in relief.

 

Castiel’s been over this, and something deep in his gut is murmuring he might not live with himself if he doesn’t take this chance.

One chance.

 

 

He’s trying to retrieve the bottom that’s dropped out of his stomach when another message appears.

 

 

 

Trying the strange idea out around in his mind, it’s unexpectedly calming. This could either work amazingly well or catastrophically, but the impending roulette wheel actually dissipates his misgivings, replacing them with charged excitement.

 

 

Downing the last of the liquid, he puts the glass in the sink. His eyes flick to the clock for the hundredth time when finally there’s a soft tap at the door. Taking a deep breath against his thrumming pulse, he pads over and reaches for the bolt.

The man waiting in the hallway is everything yet nothing like he remembers from ten days before. His long legs, hair and sure hands were all the same, though the subtly burnished skin is bleached of the charming freckles by the fluorescent light. The gaze seared so vividly into his recollection, green flecked with sunburst like the afternoon light stippled behind the late summer leaves of his favorite tree, the one towering over his —their bench. Then the plush mouth, of which Castiel’s abiding memory is watching it part to the most erotic plastic fork in the history of transitory utensils.

But that’s where the recognition ends. _This_ man hovers unsure, not bold and teasing. Broad shoulders tense, arms stiff at his sides, expression guarded and uncertain. It strikes a sharp note - he should be wary but instead he pulls the man by the sleeve over his threshold to offer him solace along with himself.

As he turns, he’s backed slowly into the closing door until the eyes that have preyed on his thoughts are _right_ _there_ , searching for permission with a sudden esurient glint. Castiel returns the stare, soft and safe against the warm cage of Dean’s body. Knuckles wind into his hair at his nape and then he’s kissed, feather light and solemn until his last constraint deflates in a sigh against Dean’s mouth. He’s pinned further, toes and hips meeting his as he tugs Dean’s bottom lip between his own, only to have it pulled away. Eyes fluttering open, he finds he’s the object of study again as a fingertip maps his hairline. “Okay?” Dean mouths, the barest whisper following a thumb ghosting over Castiel’s mouth.

All Castiel can feel is the slow uncoiling of desire, unburdened and immediate. Lifting his hands from where they’re clenched in Dean’s jacket he encircles his jaw, and like _that_ he’s drunk on the ability to touch. He brushes his answer along the line of Dean’s cheekbones and punctuates it with a sucking bite to his thumb.

From then on time dissolves, every moment marked by sensation, easy and intuitive. Urgent kisses intersperse with languid ones, clutches at layers of clothing to find each other’s bare waist, searing skin revealed during a stuttered journey to the bedroom. Castiel finds Dean responsive and malleable as they take their time unwrapping and unwinding each other, laying each other out and charting textures, curves and tang under tongues, hushed but for arching gasps and indulgent sighs.

It’s not until he lies wrung, thighs shaking, sticky and over-sensitized next to his visitor, that Castiel is afforded the objectivity to consider why several hours passed like a dream. Every graze of skin, every trace of muscle and responding illicit shiver had been born of an eerie familiarity, like precast components fitting together, the intimacy that had mushroomed between them heightening the taboo of silent exploration and discovery. It was as if they instinctively knew each other’s terrain, making it unlike any first time with someone he’d ever experienced.

Reluctant to break the spell, Castiel escapes Dean’s loose embrace for the bathroom to wipe himself, returning to bed with a washcloth for his companion. Propped on one elbow he watches its path, following the goose-pimpling wake with timid fingertips as he silently wishes Dean stay a little longer. Discarding the cloth Dean wraps a palm behind Castiel’s neck and pulls him down, bulldozing the unspoken question out of the way with his tongue.

Kisses melt into a drowsy lull as the hyper-arousal and tension of the past week seeps away, replaced by a luxuriant fatigue. “Nice to meet you, Castiel,” Dean hums against Castiel’s lips as they drift.

“And you, Dean,” he returns, refusing to consider tomorrow.

+

Castiel’s eyes blink open to the sun filtering from behind the curtain to fall on the hay of Dean’s hair, green eyes already focused on him.

It’s unnerving, but his heart lists dangerously in response to the presence of his bedmate. “Hey, Stranger,” Dean smiles as Castiel rouses. “You’re one heavy sleeper. You passed out, and when I tried to take advantage of you in the middle of the night you barely stirred. I was mortally offended,” he adds with a betraying grin.

Seeing an opportunity, Castiel reaches to pluck at an eyelash dangling on Dean’s cheek. Suspending it on the pad of his finger, he holds it up to his companion’s mouth to study Dean’s lips as they purse and release a puff, sending the tiny hair astray. _Obscene_ he confirms.

“You’re staring,” Dean notes, staring mirthfully back. “And are we talking now or…?”

“Yes,” he mumbles, abruptly self-conscious.

“You might change your mind. I have a confession.” Castiel glances back at Dean’s suddenly clouded face. “Um, that day, in the park… it wasn’t the first time I’d seen you.”

“Go on.”

“I’m often walking through there to class and I’d seen you a few times. You intrigued me. So I kinda, uh— lurked until an opportunity presented itself.”

“Why would that change my mind?”

“I just didn’t wanna start something when I hadn’t come clean earlier about creepily stalking you. ”

“I see.” Bemused and warmed, he pretends to ponder while Dean fidgets. “Are you hiding anything else?”

Castiel’s telephone interrupts loudly. He frowns, then realizes there is only one person who’d risk calling him early on a Saturday.

The answer machine kicks in, a relic Castiel bought at Goodwill. The kind, he realizes with growing horror, that plays the call aloud as it records.

 _“Cassie!”_ Balthazar’s voice bellows out in the cavernous living area. “ _Cas my dear, are you awake? Get your lazy arse out of bed and tell me about meeting your boyfriend, or I’ll come around to tickle it out of you!”_

Castiel grimaces, willing his friend to shut up as the voice continues airily; “ _—unless, of course, things went_ very _well and you are busy smooching in bed, in which case, ignore me. Au revoir!_ ”

The call clicks off, and Castiel reaches overhead for a pillow to muffle his embarrassed groan.  A weight straddles him before the pillow is swiftly removed and Dean’s face dips toward his, merriment shimmering through his eyes.

“So, I’m not the only one keeping secrets! Boyfriend, huh? Should I be making tracks before he gets home?” Dean teases, looking nervously over his shoulder.

Still wanting to hide Castiel slaps his palms over his eyes. “I _never_ used that term,” he valiantly defends.

Dean pulls his hands from his face, planting them roughly above Castiel’s head with a smirk. “Maybe it’s one you should adopt into your superior vocabulary.”

“Uh?” is all Castiel can manage as Dean lowers further. “Oh,” he sighs in understanding as he’s resoundingly kissed.

“Your friend has some good ideas,” Dean eventually declares from inches above, drilling him into the bed with a menacing look and throwing in a fleeting lick of his lavish pout for extra effect.

Castiel greedily tracks the tiny movement. “He does?”

“Yeah,” Dean drawls,”

His eyes widen, panic-stricken. “I _hate_ being tickled!” he warns.

“Noted,” Dean accepts then adds, brows dancing, “But I like the part about smooching all day as well.”

“Oh,” Castiel echoes as the curved smile on the familiar stranger’s lips meets his own, his brain working just long enough to decide he doesn’t hate Balthazar after all.

 

 

 


End file.
